1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic apparatus having a RF tag communication function.
2. Description of Related Art
An electronic apparatus using RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) may be an electronic apparatus having a RF tag reader/writer which executes reading and writing on a RF tag by radio communication.
Such an electronic apparatus having a RF tag communication function controls a RF tag reader/writer by a main controller provided in the electronic apparatus. The RF tag reader/writer comprises a controller, a radio communication section and other parts and drives the radio communication in accordance with the main controller to execute reading and writing of data on the RF tag. Such electronic apparatuses having the RF tag communication function are described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. Hei 11-186937 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. Hei 3-121878.
The electronic apparatus may experience a communication error (a reading and writing error) for communication with the RF tag for various reasons. The reasons for the error could be an incorrect connection between the main controller and the RF tag reader/writer, a breakdown of the controller or the radio communication section of the RF tag reader/writer, the RF tag being incapable of radio communication with the RF tag reader/writer, and other reasons. To correct the communication error, identification of a reason for the error is necessary. To identify the reason, possible causes need to be checked one by one, and this process is troublesome.
Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. Hei 11-186937 discloses a self-diagnostic technology of the RF tag reader/writer; however, this self-diagnostic technology is not useful to identify a reason for error from various elements of the RF tag reader/writer, since the self-diagnostic technology checks only an operation of the RF tag reader/writer as a whole instead of an operation of each part. Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. Hei 3-121878 also discloses a self-diagnostic technology of a printer; however, there is no description or suggestion about a diagnosis of the communication error for the RF tag.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide an electronic apparatus which enables easy identification of the reason for the communication error for communication with the RF tag.